Poems on Slavery

About the book

"Poems on Slavery" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow is a collection of poems published in 1842. Written mostly at sea during a storm-tossed voyage from England, these eight poems champion the anti-slavery cause through vivid portraits of enslaved people—from a captive dreaming of his African kingdom to voices rising from a sunken slave ship. Longfellow risked his commercial success and public reputation by publishing this controversial work, fulfilling his friend's request to write "stirring words that shall move the whole land."